Space Project
So the situation is that we have been actively attempting to secure new space for the CSC for the past 2.5 years (a guess.)
The way we have been going about this has been mostly behind scenes scheming. Originally, MathSoc came to us with the idea (mcgreco specifically.) Perhaps it would be most effective at this point to assert our desires explicitly.
To this end j3parker has suggested we prepare a high quality proposal. This wiki page is for organizing the content-collection process for this proposal.
Major sections of the proposal
We should make it clear that while we have an office, it isn't an office. It's social and academic space, used by a large number of students. Expanding it would allow us to continue using it as such.
Usage Data
Data about our office usage: how many people (distinct vs. not) enter our office throughout the week, how much our terminals are used etc.
Possible collection schemes:
- Have office staff keep a tally sheet
- Record captures from the cameras at say 15 minute intervals, tally at the end of the day, and delete the images.
Data about our membership: fractions from which faculties, alumni, raw numbers.
Related to this is talk and event attendance, the difference between max in the office at a moment and event attendees will be a good indicator of space discrepancies.
Expansion plan
- How we would use the space:
- A mockup of how we would design the office with the additional space.
- b4taylor and j3parker have volunteered to do early drafts in Google Sketchup
- ehashman has completed a draft space plan, to be discussed
- Jack Rehder was initially opposed to tearing the wall down, due to renovation costs.? In particular, the floor will need to be refinished, so it's not simply dismantling a wall. Instead, he proposed putting a door (or two) in.
- Costs to go along with the renovations proposed in the mock up, and evidence we can afford it.
- We know the price of new shelving, furniture is easy to quote. The hard part will be the wall price
- Expand our library to include the vast archives of ACM journals we have in storage.
- Centre of office could have a quality bar style table/chairs installed which would allow for better laptop usage, space for projects (working on hardware etc. is difficult in our currently cramped office.)
- Probably at least 3 more terminals. This is a very convenient resource for students and ours are constantly in use.
- More inviting atmosphere due to decrease in human density. (smelly, hot etc.)
- A mockup of how we would design the office with the additional space.
Testimonials
- Testimonials from members on what CSC has done for them; from randoms on why they don't frequent the CSC.
- Possible way to obtain them: include the request (magic form perhaps) in the call for renewals, send it out extra early. Caveat with this: we miss people who have registered many terms in advance. Perhaps use csc-general and apologize to the duplicate set?
- Might also want: alumni testimonials, testimonials from out of town speakers about their impression of us, testimonials from faculty/recruiting people (this last one ties in to the section below)
What the CSC brings to UW
The school seems to be well aware of our classiness; the other day (and this is not the first time) a tour guide brought a family to our office and mentioned that we hold lots of events and bring in out of town speakers that "the university can't even get". The tour guide (not Gayle) was an adult and I imagine had no non-PR connection to the CSC.
Why other space is not suitable
We may not want to include this section off the bat, but having the arguments worked out will be useful preparation.
I have said before and stand by the claim that the exec office is the only viable location for extra space. The main reason being that if we had a disjoint office, there is a tendency to pick one location and stick to it, which is a negative for club cohesion (as evidence, i present the CMC office and the terms in which it sucked away subsets of CSC members.)
Plan Implementation
We can present this to SCS and ask that they back our plan (no work for them, they benefit indirectly and they seem to like helping us) and we schedule a meeting with the math faculty admin + MathSoc. The goal would be to come up with a suitable plan for where to move the exec office such that all parties remain happy. When framed this way, I think our case is strong: we have an obvious use for extra office space, the location of the exec office isn't vital*, and there is very likely to be some space available.
Timeline
- Data collection, Due Oct 15
- Office usage: Get numbers from Orientation week until 2nd week of October. Store in a spreadsheet or something, at that point summary statistics are trivial.
- Member statistics: can be done any time, but should be done after fall recruiting so fall numbers are accurate.
- Event statistics: This one is harder, if we don't have any events before Oct 15 (which would be sad). We might also want to recall old statistics, though I trust no one's memory on these things.
- Expansion plan,
- Mock-up designs for wall removed, half wall, and doors in the wall should be prepared. To avoid lazy, disinterest, and interference from coursework, Due Sept 12
- Quotes. Once we have a reasonable mock-up we can come up with quotes related to it. Due Sept 30th, along with any mock-up revisions that occur when we realize how goddamn expensive something is.
- Detailed library inventory, size estimates, and expansion plans. This will help quantify the needed shelving and justify it. Since this is related to the Library Project and ebering wants to get it done, Due Sept 12.
- Testimonials, Due Oct 15
- Requests to csc-general and renewing members. We can, realistically, send these out whenever. Probably best to do it just before the start of classes, so that people are looking for school related things but also have time, say Sept 10
- We should probably specify a sooner due-date in the solicitations for testimonials, say Sept 30.
- Finding people who aren't normally CSCers can and should be done in two ways. There are the people who come to events but don't use the office (regardless of membership status), and people who have nothing to do with us. Should get commentary from both, but this will require a more personal approach, at least in the latter case. Try to have these in by Oct 15
- Other testimonials can be collected however, should be done by Oct 15.
- What the CSC Brings to UW and Why other space won't work. Due Oct 15
- These are just blocks of text, but we should send them through a few draft iterates. First draft Due Sept 12, iterate from there until done.
- Proposal formatting/typesetting/preparation, Due Oct 16
- Once all of the above is collected, we can assemble the document. This should go rather quickly, and take a day at most.
- Submit proposal and meet with SCS Week of Oct 17th.
- Beyond this, planning relies on a lot of other people so here the timeline ends.
